Life's Surprises in Kerouac's On the Road

Okay, I’ll admit it: I prejudged the “Beat” Generation and all of its related literature before reading any of it, and before really knowing too much about it. This is kind of embarrassing to divulge, but I honestly associated them with the’60s hippie subculture; I didn’t really dislike any of it. It was more of an indifference, or the belief that “I know that ‘Beat’ writers and individuals greatly impacted the social, cultural, and literary scene of America during the mid 20th century, but I’m not really interested, so I’m just not going to go there. There are too many other works and movements that I would rather spend my time exploring.” I’ve even visited the Beat Museum in San Francisco with my family, and while I took it all in, I still wasn’t inspired enough to really explore it.


My hesitancy and disinterest was directly associated with some sort of image of the Beat players—Jack Kerouac, Neal Cassady, Allen Ginsberg, etc.—that I had somehow formed in my mind. I saw them clad in all black, in tight black turtlenecks and shades, smoking cigarettes, and spouting off some incoherent poetry. Don’t ask me how this impression of Beats took shape in my mind, but for whatever reason, it did. Obviously, my notion of the Beat Generation was off, which became ever so clear to me when I recently picked up and read Kerouac’s 1957 work On the Road. Now, this is my first foray into Beat literature, so I am by no means any scholar, but I am happy to explain how wrong I was about the Beats, or at least about Jack Kerouac and his 1957 piece.

Like all works of meaningful literature, there are many components that make it important and relevant. In this post, I am just going to focus on one aspect of On the Road that not only touched me, but that also enlightened me about what it means to be “Beat.” Instead of the abstract, alternative text I was expecting, I was pleasantly surprised by the energetic hope and genuine pleasure Sal (the character Kerouac is based on) seeks and has for the experiences his country offers. Whether these experiences involve jazz performances, long, intellectual discussions with Dean (or Cassady), or relishing the beauty and simplicity of the land, Kerouac essentially embraces the genuine and pure moments of life in On the Road. Sal reminds me that all experiences, particularly new experiences, make life more meaningful. Like in life, moments of sadness and pain intermix with moments joy and happiness; there are definitely sad and painful undertones in On the Road, but ultimately, the text is so much more hopeful than I expected it to be. Its excitement in the simplicities of life makes me excited just to be alive, especially with all the freedom I am so lucky to have.

So, I ask you, readers: what text pleasantly surprised you, and why? Also, what about life excites you? Kerouac shared his feelings; what are yours?

Old MacMelville has a farm? Eee-aye-eee-aye-OH?

April is normally known in literary circles as National Poetry Month but unofficially in my mind it has a second, even better title – Read and Grade Outside Month.  I always find that I am less productive in the spring but much more poetic / drowsy (which is not necessarily a bad thing). 

During those tentative spring weekends, at the first sign of glorious Bay Area weather, I sprint outdoors, laden with piles of paper, my trusty colorful felt pens and a tall glass of apple juice, vowing that the time away from my computer will turn me into a lean-mean grading machine.  Instead, I morph into some suburban sighing Wordsworth who spends all her time marveling at the flowers blooming, the sound of her neighbor’s wind-chimes tinkling softly in the distance, and the sweet-smelling breeze gently playing with her hair, knocking her long-forgotten papers to the ground.  It takes a good ten minutes of watching a spider crawl up a wall or staring down a squirrel trying to plant a peanut into a flowerbox to realize that my mind has wandered entirely away from my students’ own efforts at creation. 

But more than just grading outside, spring is the time when my reading habits change.  Just as I peel off my thick knitted sweaters to expose my luminescent arms and skim off the serious comments on their essays; once I see that first hint of green, I start searching for that perfect farming / outdoorsy work book to read.  In this mood over the past few years I’ve polished off works like Animal, Vegetable, Miracle (Kingsolver); Little Heathens (Kalish); The Maine Woods (Thoreau), and well, you get the general picture.  This year it’s been two books for me – The Blueberry Years by Jim Minick (recently finished) and The Dirty Life by Kristin Kimball (just arrived today in the mail). 

Now, as much as I love to say my emphasis is eco. lit., anyone who knows me relatively well also realizes that I am not the world’s greatest expert on flora, fauna, camping, or farming, so obviously I’m not looking to brush up on my areas of expertise.  The biggest kitchen garden I’ve worked on so far fit into my parents’ cramped suburban backyard and the most exotic vegetable we ever planted was a string bean.  My idea of hiking is puffing along a beaten dirt path with clearly labeled signs and my favorite stories of “roughing it” involve going to a camp-ground that featured whirlpool tubs in the “rustic” heated cabins.  I couldn’t tell you how to use a fancy piece of farming equipment if my life depended on it, and yet, I can tell you plenty about the wonderful world of farming memoirs. 

I just can’t get enough of these stories of people who have turned their backs on the bland, season-suffering cities to dig their fingers, toes, and souls into the dirt to uncover a more satisfying and meaningful life.  I love to hear about the brush they clear, the acres they plant, the hours and hours of pruning / picking / cleaning / shelling / canning / cooking and selling that they devote to their produce.  The technical details are easily ignorable – the farming jargon, diagrams, and schematics roll past my eyes without even a blink – but I find something so comforting in the telling of these utterly different lives.  I see myself identifying with these “gentlemen farmers” (as one of these memoirists once called he and his fellow farmer-writers) even though I have never once tried one of the recipes so lovingly typed out in the final chapter. 

I think my “spring” love for this very specific genre can be summed up in a very specific story.  Jim Minick in The Blueberry Years reflects about the many people who came to his pick-your-own organic blueberry farm and what the bushes mean to the masses.  In one of his many short chapters, Minick writes about (what seems to be his favorite story) a mother who shows up early one day in the family sedan, breathing in the country air with eager lungs.  She explains to Jim that she drove her young daughter from several states away to his rural Virginia farm so she could have the chance to live out her favorite book – Blueberries for Sal.  He expected them to last quite a while but was surprised when they simply delighted in spending a few minutes losing themselves into this sweet little acreage.  It was enough for them to have a few blueberries, take a few pictures (sans bears), and head back home enriched by the “farm life” with their imagination to fill in the rest.    

Just like that little girl, it’s enough for me to head outside, read a few chapters about rich farmland, grade a few papers, listen to a few birds chirp and be enriched.  Right now, I don’t have the time or the inclination to fully grasp at this lifestyle, but my creativity can push me out of the suburban landscape into the world of bountiful acres and open sky.  After all, in the first signs of spring, what could be better than having the best of the natural / thinking world to fill in my own green space?  As long as I don’t get a farmer’s tan from my lounge-chair plowing, I’ll be perfectly happy; right after I finish this grading…